The old mare quickened her pace as she saw her stable door ahead of her.  The lines hung limp and loose in her master’s hands.  Under the pressure of distress about this dreadful two hundred dollars he had forgotten to be glad that Grace was again with them.

Doctor Wainwright was an easy-going as well as a hopeful sort of man, but he was an honest person, and he knew that creditors have a right to be insistent.  It distressed him to drag around a load of debt.  For days together the poor doctor had driven a long way round rather than to pass Potter’s store on the main street, the dread of some such encounter and the shame of his position weighing heavily on his soul.  It was the harder for him that he had made it a rule never to appear anxious before his wife.  Mrs. Wainwright had enough to bear in being ill and in pain.  The doctor braced himself and threw back his shoulders as if casting off a load, as the mare, of her own accord, stopped at the door.

The house was full of light.  Merry voices overflowed in rippling speech and laughter.  Out swarmed the children to meet papa, and one sweet girl kissed him over and over.  “Here I am,” she said, “your middle daughter, dearest.  Here I am.”

CHAPTER III.

GRACE TAKES A HAND.

“Mother, darling, may I have a good long talk with you to-day, a confidential talk, we two by ourselves?”

“Yes, Grace, I shall be delighted.”

“And when can it be?  You always have so many around you, dear; and no wonder, this is the centre of the house, this chair, which is your throne.”

“Well, let me see,” said Mrs. Wainwright, considering.  “After dinner the children go to Sunday-school, and papa has always a few Sunday patients whom he must visit.  Between two and four I am always alone on Sunday and we can have a chat then.  Mildred and Frances will probably walk home with Miriam and want to carry you off to the Manse to tea.”

“Not on my first home Sunday, mamma,” said Grace.  “I must have every littlest bit of that here, though I do expect to have good times with the Manse girls.  Is Mrs. Raeburn as sweet as ever?  I remember her standing at the station and waving me good-bye when I went away with auntie, and Amy, the dearest wee fairy, was by her side.”

“Amy is full of plans,” said Mrs. Wainwright.  “She is going to the League to study art if her mother can spare her.  Mildred and Frances want to go on with their French, and one of the little boys, I forget which, has musical talent; but there is no one in Highland who can teach the piano.  The Raeburn children are all clever and bright.”

“They could hardly help being that, mamma, with such a father and mother, and the atmosphere of such a home.”